Sunshine

Went to see the new film 'Sunshine' on Friday night. It's the new film by Danny Boyle, the director of 'Trainspotting' and is written by Alex Garland, the writer of 'The Beach'. I really enjoyed it, although there were quite a few minutes where I was jumping and Charlotte had her hands over her eyes! It's a science fiction film but much more intelligent and visual than your normal blockbuster sci fi. Really impressive design and cinematography and great to see it o the big screen. The ending with a strange plot development was a bit wierd - you could either view it as something really literal, or you could go for the mystical option, which I think I'll do.

Also great to see Kiwi actor Cliff Curtis in the cast as Searle, the psychologist.

yarp!

Absolutely adored Hot Fuzz which we saw at the movies on Saturday night. It was made by the team behind 'Shaun of the Dead' and 'Spaced'. Lots of fun cultural references and catch phrases I'm sure will be entering the language now... Megan found this great list of cultural references on Wikipedia, and I also loved the video blog available here - check out episode 8 for a very special guest!

Also went to see 'The Science of Sleep', the new Michel Gondry film. It was quite charming, but a bit silly.

regal!

the queen
Originally uploaded by machu picchu.

Went to see 'The Queen' this afternoon - it's the story of what happened to the Queen over the week following Diana's death in August 1997. It was fascinating - showing history that we can remember actually taking place is so intriguing. We can all remember what we were doing that week - especially those of us who were actually in London! Helen Mirren and Michael Sheen as the Queen and Tony Blair in particular were superb.

rebooted!

Went to see the new James Bond film, Casino Royale, last night. It was very enjoyable and a bit of a departure from recent Bonds (I don't think I actually ever saw an entire Pierce Brosnan one however!) Daniel Craig was very good as Bond, quite a bit grittier than his predecessors. There were a couple of fantastic stunt sequences - the opening 'parkour' scenes were amazing and also the house in Venice was spectacular. Montenegro, where the Casino Royale itself is meant to be, looked strangely picturesque and quite different from when I was there a couple of years ago, but from looking at the credits, it was actually shot in the Czech Republic! Also spotted the hotel where Charlotte and I had stayed in Venice during one scene. Was reading in Wikipedia that the new James Bond is described as a 'reboot' rather than a relaunch - how modern!